


13

by saturnsage



Category: Fallen Hero Series - Malin Rydén
Genre: Hunger Games AU, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-02-28
Updated: 2019-02-28
Packaged: 2019-11-07 05:16:49
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,481
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17954288
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/saturnsage/pseuds/saturnsage
Summary: the lady’s hair is a bright green, and her eyelids are painted gold. she grabs a strip of paper from the giant bowl, and Ortega watches the movement to make sure she doesn’t pick another one out of her silky, embroidered sleeve.the slip of paper opens, and so does the lady’s green painted mouth.“Jie-Sun Park,” the lady sings, “will be the male tribute of district 10! congratulations! will Jie-Sun Park please step up onto the stage?”he closes his eyes.





	13

**Author's Note:**

> this au is great and im foaming at the mouth about it thank you and goodnight

his hands are still hot with the blood that he stained them with when he sees the girl.   
  
she’s no more than fifteen. her eyes are wild, her face smudged with dirt. her long hair is tangled in with sticks, and her outfit is ripped on the knees, one of the bleeding badly.   
  
there’s something wrong with her. there’s no way the last girl standing looks like a deer in headlights. there’s no way the last thing stopping him from getting out of this- this _hell_ , is a tiny little girl whose sobs are loud against the quiet arena.  
  
jie-sun uses this moment to catch his breath, and places a hand on a tree trunk, head spinning. how many did he kill? five. two in a fair fight, one in an ambush, one in a group effort, and one where the woman, old enough to be his mother, died in her sleep.   
  
he made that one quiet. painless. he wishes he were religious then. he wishes-  
  
“please,” the girl cries. for some reason, he can’t remember her name, he can’t remember which district she’s from. it’s probably because of the headache. jie-sun’s shredded foot screams in symphony. he had to rip it out of a mutt’s gnawing mouth, rip the jaw in two with nothing but adrenaline and the sais he has right now laying on his hip. 

 

“please,” she hiccups again, and jie-sun sighs, leaning into the tree.   
  
“yeah, okay.” he whispers. “we can take a break?”   
  
“i don’t wanna die,” she sobs.   
  
jie-sun is silent on that. she’s come so far. did she do nothing but run?

 _  
“_ this place is scary, isn’t it?” jie-sun tries, wiping the blood on his pants. he drops the sais as well, because after everything, nothing about this is easy. they’re the last two. he’s prolonging it. the gamemasters aren’t gonna like it. “why don’t you tell me your name? we can just talk for a little bit.”   
  
“no,” she mutters. her eyes are as wide as saucers and they look a million miles away, glazed so thick he can’t tell you her eye color if he wanted to. “no no no. no, no. they’re gonna. no, no no no! _your head. your HEAD._ ** _YOUR HEAD-_** ”   
  
the girl screams, and suddenly, jie-sun’s head explodes into three million bits, and he feels like he’s screaming too. there’s nothing but the head pieces he has left, and they all cluster into his throat, into his nose, and he can’t breathe, he can’t see-

 

 

( _“there’s going to be things they won’t show on the screens,” ricardo whispers, his mouth against jie-sun’s neck. “things that they can’t make glittered enough. there’s so much i didn’t have time to tell you.”_  
  
“i’m sorry.” jie-sun whispers, and he holds ricardo tighter. it’s almost time. there’s thirty minutes until the train lands in the capitol.   
  
“i don’t care what happens, as shitty as that makes me sound. i don’t. whatever happens, just-“ ricardo’s breath hitches against the naked nape of his neck, and jie-sun shudders. “please don’t die. come back to me, alright?” 

 

_jie-sun hums, traces the scars on Ricardo’s back. half of them were from his own doing, utilizing the barrier with him as a conduit against those who tried to kill him. the first time he used the power surge, he killed four people right then and there._

 

 _the capitol nicknamed him Charge. he remembers feeling nothing but relief so strong he vomited on the floor when he saw ricardo on the victor’s pedestal._  
  
“i love you,” ricardo whispers, kissing the spot where he says them. “God, i love you so much.”  
  
“i’ll come back,” he promises. “i’ll come back.” )  


 

 _________  
  
he stood before the president in a sunny day in march, or april. he doesn’t remember much about the date, but he does remember strictly that his wrists had hurt from the night before because the girl of the night liked the idea of holding him down, and he distinctly remembers the President watering some sort of succulent on their desk. he distinctly remembers sinking into the plush chair, overwhelmed with the scent of plants that aren’t wheat, barley.   
  
“why, Ortega,” they had said, not looking up from the succulent, “marvelous performance back in the Games. i apologize for not contacting you sooner. busy, you see.”   
  
“it’s…no trouble.” he had replied, and his voice was rasp from thirst. that he remembers as well. “thank you.”   
  
“hmm.” not a splatter of water dropped when they stopped, not a speck of dirt on the papers next to the plant. “i am sorry to hear of your father.” 

 

‘ _i don’t care. i don’t care that he’s dead. and i don’t care that you killed him. i don’t care because i know i don’t regret winning.’_ he had thought, but instead he thinned his smile, acting forlorn.   
  
“it’s alright. these things happen.” he had offered, and that’s, he remembers, when the President looked up at him with two half-blind eyes, with wrinkled skin old and aged and pale. they had smiled, then.   
  
“yes, they do, don’t they?” they had lilted, and then Ortega distinctly remembers the President leaning back in their chair, clasping their old hands. “such a shame that they happen to those who don’t deserve such a fate.”  
  
_‘i don’t care that you killed him because of me breaking the rules.’_ he had thought. _‘but i know he won’t be the only one.’_

 

 ______  
  
the lady’s hair is a bright green, and her eyelids are painted gold. she grabs a strip of paper from the giant bowl, and Ortega watches the movement to make sure she doesn’t pick another one out of her silky, embroidered sleeve. 

  
the crowd is silent, and the girl that she had called beforehand cries silently without wiping them. hesqueezes her shoulder before letting go to let her know that he’s sorry.   
  
the slip of paper opens, and so does the lady’s green painted mouth.   
  
“Jie-Sun Park,” the lady sings, “will be the male tribute of district 10! congratulations! will Jie-Sun Park please step up onto the stage?”   
  
he closes his eyes.

 

it was one slip. he had made sure Jie-Sun wouldn’t put in any more. it was one slip, and he has no idea how it happened. 

 

when Ortega opens his eyes, Jie-Sun walks stiffly, eyes watery, jaw clenched. when the lady touches his elbow to let him in for a hug, he slaps it away. he stands in front of the guards who point their guns at him, at the now clapping crowd and only a single tear drops down from his cheek.   
  
then he turns around, and looks straight at Ortega. Ortega’s smile falters, and it falls.

 

the girl sobs, and she’s taken to the rooms where her family waits to say their (last) goodbyes. Ortega knows she won’t make it. he’ll still try to keep her alive, because that’s his punishment for winning.   
  
Jie-Sun stares silently as the lady keeps talking, and then when he’s allowed, stalks over to Ortega.   


he’s been placed where the microphones won’t hear the two of them. he has to physically stop himself from wiping off the tear still left on the taller man’s cheek. instead of standing side-by-side, Jie-Sun stands in front, blocking Ortega from view. 

  
“i’m not letting them take me away from you,” Jie-sun whispers back, and his brown eyes burn into fire. they gleam with unshed tears, with rage, with fear, with things left unsaid. his lips tremble, his brows furrow together, his fists clench and unclench. his breaths are shaky, and Ortega sighs.   


“i think this is my fault,” Ortega whispers, and Jie-Sun shudders. out of what emotion, he can’t tell.

  
“stop me from doing something really fucking stupid, you have two seconds.” Jie-Sun whispers, now rushed, now hurried, and before Ortega can say anything, he takes a shaking hand and rests it gently on Ortega’s cheek. without even thinking, the shorter man leans into it. it’s calloused, it’s familiar, it’s warm and lovely.   
  
the kiss that comes next is soft, like Jie-Sun’s holding back into something that’s a shade too quiet. he doesn’t have the strength to fight back, to pretend this isn’t old, this isn’t routine, this isn’t usual.   
  
the lady on the stage gasps dramatically, and jie-sun brushes his thumb against ortega’s cheekbone as their mouths move against each others’.  
  
when they break off, it’s a staring contest that says more than one million words. it’s worth more than anything they’ve ever seen, they’ve ever hated, they’ve ever loved.   
  
“they’re going to use this against you” ricardo huffs into their shared breaths, not looking away.   
  
“you think i give a shit?” is the answer, and neither of them smile.  
  
  
______  


the cameras are a familiar brightness, and it hurts his eyes so much that he blinks longer than usual. the epilepsy gives him a hard time, but the Capitol can’t know about weaknesses. instead, he trudges into the spotlight, smile wide with bleached teeth, with a careless wink, with a shirt he knows looks well on him, with his curls looking lovely and soft.   
  
someone will probably pay a pretty penny for him later on. not tonight, but after the games. 

 

when he sits unto the couch thats wired with microphones so they can’t miss a single word, when the cameras point in every single way, because this is just like every other day, because this was just like last year. 

 

the interviewer is new, and relatively young, with bright orange hair swirled into a sorbet, and with a shining bejeweled yellow and blue three piece suit that hurt’s Ortega’s eyes every time she moves it. her eyes are wide and plastic, her smile is looming and tv-ready. she’s the dripping picture of entertainment hungry capitol citizens, and he’s already slept with her, he thinks. he can’t remember. he always tries to forget.   
  
but he leans into her space anyways, hoods his eyes just right. pretend that her assets are what he’s interested in looking at. 

  
the interviewer welcomes in the screaming audience, and Ortega plays the part that they gave him, and goes through the regular pleasantries, the jokes, the ribbings, the charm.   
  
suddenly, she clears her throat, and Ortega knows this is what he’s been dreading this entire time. because the press didn’t know he had a ‘sweetheart’, because they didn’t know he was even interested in men, because they didn’t know something.   
  
she bats her five inch long blue eyelashes, and her sickly sweet voice claws at him. “we have very telling evidence that you and Jie-Sun Park aren’t quite just simply mentor and tribute, Mr. Ortega.”  
  
his grin turns sly, like he’s about to gossip to a close friend. he knows Jie-Sun’s watching this. they’ll force him to. “you know me, Margila,”he coos, “i just can’t resist a pretty face.”   
  
she giggles at that, and the audience cheers. “oh, you sure can’t! care to tell us the story behind it?”

 

don’t tell them the truth. thats only the two of theirs. make it prettier, make it boring, make it capitol.  
  
and so he vomits out sweet words, and taps his cheek, pretending to try to conjure it up.  
  
“i met him when i was twenty five, and he twenty. it was maybe three years before i got reaped, yes?” ortega looks at the crowd, as if in confirmation. then he nods, as if satisfied.“although i knew he lived in our district his entire life, i never noticed him until this one day, where he was taming one of the horses.”   
  
margila leans in, ravenous. good. make it pretty, make it boring.

 

“she was the wildest one we have, no one who tried could ever tame the mare, but jie-sun was there anyways, and i just stared you know? he wasn’t using any equipment. just his hands, with no saddle, just his hands holding on to the mane.” he gestures wildly with his hands, as if to make it dynamic, try to get the audience to picture it.   
  
“it was like watching a war, kind of. eventually the horse jumped so high he lost his grip, but before she could trample him to death, he clawed at her torso, while she was galloping back and forth, and climbed back on, and broke her. i’ve never seen anything like it.”   
  
Margila gasps, and laughs at it. it’s a boring story, made interesting by jie-sun’s stubbornness and ortega’s infatuation.   
  
the truth is this: Ortega found him fighting off five guards at once, with nothing but his fists. his nose was broken and he has bleeding in three different spaces, but he still fought against the butts of their guns.and Ortega watched him take them out one by one, andhe watched Jie-Sun stand tall, despite being broken. he watched the bleeding man swerve his face toward himself, andOrtega suddenly thought he’s never seen a more wilder face. Jie-Sun tried to limp away, but you didn’t let him. instead he took the fighter home, tended to his wounds.   
  
three months later, Ortega kissed him so hard both of their teeth clanked, and Jie-Sun told him that he’s from district 13, and he’s here to kill the capitol, so Ortega kissed him harder, and tasted him in a way only desperate men can. 

 

the story he told the press was true, but it wasn’t the one where he fell in love.   


“is that why you took such…electrifying measures to win?” the interviewer asks.  
  
Ricardo booms a laugh, winks again. “of course. i made a promise that i’d come back. i don’t break my word.”  
  
“ and, how do you feel about mentoring jie-sun? with you relationship together and all?”   
  
_‘like i want everyone in this room to burn.’_  
  
he hums, twiddles a stray curl with a finger. “well, i’m confident that thisyear’s game to going to be very, very interesting.”  


‘ _like i want you to feel what i did when i heard his name being called. like i did when i lost my legs. like i want justice.’_

 

____  


the screams that come out of the audio have everyone holding their ears to keep it from bleeding, everyone shouting.   
  
the cameras showed nothing but Jie-Sun leaning against a tree, dropping his weapons, and a little girl a few feet away.the cameras showed everything in great detail. the sobbing, the shredded foot, Jie-Sun’s weak gasps of air and burning brown eyes, limp black hair so black it’s blue, his soaked uniform, the ugly way he fought.   
  
there was nothing. there was nothing but a small clearing next to a cliff, and Ortega has been clutching the screen so hard he threatened to break it more that three times.he knows there are cameras filming him, and for once in his entire life he doesn’t care. nothing about it matters.   
  
the screen so clear and detailed one second, perfectly showing Jie-Sun suddenly clutching at his face and falling to his knees, blacks out.   
  
“no,” he says. the microphones they embedded in him pick it up.   
  
the screen pops back up, and this time Jie-Sun is screaming even louder, and there’s a tinny _shut up shut up for the love of God stop and shut up SHUT THE FUCK UP WHAT ARE YOU-_

 

and the screen so clear and detailed in showing all of this, blacks out.   
  
“no, please.” he says. spider-web cracks form at the end of the screen. he doesn’t notice the sirens wailing, the officers running around calling orders, the game-masters frantically pushing buttons and crying out in confusion. 

 

the screen pops back up, this time greyed and frizzed, and Jie-Sun is crying, and he’s scratching his face with his dirty bloody hands. fresh blood starts to trickle as he repeatedly claws over his eyes, over his mouth. 

 

 _STOP IT SHUT UP I DIDN’T HAVE A CHOICE I DIDN’T HAVE A CHOICE-_  
  
and the screen that used to be so clear and detailed, now slightly blurred in showing all of this, blacks out.   
  
“God, please, no.” he says, and the words clog his wind-pipe. it sounds desperate when one of the cameras pick it up and play it out on a different screen.the cracks grow larger. 

 

the screen pops back, showing an image of the limp girl with fish-dead eyes now, and then it glitches to Jie-Sun standing on the edge of a cliff, looking down. you can’t see his face, it’s so red.   
  
the screen doesn’t black out, and Jie-Sun jumps.  
  
the screen doesn’t black out, and while there isn’t a cannon, a plane comes and reaches a metal claw to pick him up. 

 

_____  
  
Ricardo Ortega, known as Charge for killing half of the contestants after utilizing the electrical barrier in ways that weren’t previously known, blacks out, and the last thing he remembers before being knocked out by a bullet to the shoulder is five dead game-masters and three broken ones.   
**  
_____**

 

they never declared him dead. 

 

it’s been seven years.  
  
_____  
  
the night before the Reaping, he sits alone in his condo, drinking a bottle’s worth of whiskey, thinking about which poor kid will have to stand out there and watch someone pick their name out of a bowl for a death sentence.   
  
his mother is back in the farm, tending to her goats and crops. she’s safe. she’s now too old to compete, and that’s one relief off his back.

 

he wonders what Chen is doing right now. probably doing the same this as Ortega does, drinking his nightmares down, drinking all the regrets and survivor’s guilt down. 

 

Ortega raises his bottle up in an invisible toast, for the companionship the two of them share.   
  
and as he takes another swig, someone knocks at his door, despite it being well-past curfew. **  
**

when he opens the door, a heavily-armed guard stands there, and Ortega thinks that this might as well be the end.   
  
his mother will be okay. he made sure of it.   


“sir.” the guard says, brisk and official.   
  
“yeah?” he asks, careful not to let his words slur from the drink.   
  
there’s no microphones or cameras here. the guard shifts.  
  
“district 13 has a message for you.” they say.   
  
ortega doesn’t let the bottle in his hands slip and shatter. instead, he’s as silent as the night outside is.   
  
“follow me.” the guard says, showing a badge only district 13 uses for proof.   
  
it’s been seven years.

  
it doesn’t matter that they never proclaimed him dead.  
  
Ortega follows the guard all the way to the edge of the electrical fence and jumps easily over it, the shocks nothing to him. he follows the guard all over to the lake that keeps wildlife and such safe, and when he reaches the edge, there’s another figure blackened by the night. 

 

the guard salutes Ortega, and then disappears farther into the woods, into the night, until they’re not visible anymore.   
  
the figure is silent, and when Ortega takes a step, they light a lantern. 

  
“hey, idiot” Jie-Sun mutters underneath a mask. his face is scarred severely, but it isn’t bleeding.   
he uses a hand to pull down the mask, and a scarred, lopsided smile is there.   
  
there’s a cane tied to Jie-Sun’s hip, and the lantern scatters shadows across the lake.   
  
Ortega takes more steps forward.  
  
“oh, oh God,” he manages. his hands shake.

 

it’s been seven years, and there’s probably a reason why they never proclaimed him dead.   


missing doesn’t mean dead.

 

“look, i’m really sorry to have been gone so long, but i needed two years to figure some shit out,” he starts, and Ortega comes close enough to gently place his hands on Jie-Sun’s shoulders. 

 

“you were gone for seven,” is all he says. idiot.   
  
“the capitol kept me for five,” Jie-Sun answers.   
  
suddenly, Ortega hugs him in the way he does only for his mother and only for Jie-Sun and only for those he loves, the ones he really loves, and there’s a disbelieving laugh that bursts forth from him, and Jie-Sun clutches him just as tightly with one hand, and they’re both laughing in the middle of the night beside a lake.   
  
Jie-Sun starts to kiss Ortega’s hair, his forehead, his nose and his eyes. Ortega doesn’t pretend to not have missed this.

 

“what are you doing here?” he asks, and Jie-Sun laughs again.   


“ ‘m gonna kill off the capitol, help you mentor the new tributes tomorrow. pretty simple i think.” 

  
Ortega kisses him deeply, because he’s loved him. 

  
“i’m dreaming. or i’m in another nightmare. or i’m hallucinating. i don’t even know anymore,” he sighs, and it sounds like a plea or a prayer.   
  
aprayer, and Jie-Sun hears it, and answers it.

 

“no, it’s not a dream. it’s real. i’m here. we’re both here.” he says, loving and warm. 

 

“alright, sidestep.” Ricardo sniffs, for the first time in so long _hopeful._


End file.
